Health Ministry embarks on LLIN registration around Kampala

Health Ministry embarks on LLIN registration around Kampala

The Ministry of Health (MoH), will embark on the sixth and last wave of the Long Lasting Insecticide (LLIN)-treated net campaign starting this Saturday. It comes after a successful distribution of mosquito nets in other parts of the country, and finally, it is time for Kampala District.

According to Vivian Sserwanja, the MoH spokesperson, registration of households in Kampala will for three days be followed by distribution of nets in February 2018. “Distribution of nets in Wakiso District shall take place on January 27th 2018, at designated distribution points in the villages. The registration exercise will be conducted by LC1 chairpersons and Village Health Team members dressed in a Chase Malaria T-shirt and a name tag for easy identification.

“They will move from house to house to register the number of people in each household. The campaign has so far achieved over 95% coverage, with a total of 23,743,822 bed nets distributed, protecting a total of 44,713,517 persons in 109 districts countrywide,” Sserwanja said.

This campaign is premised on the background that large-scale LLIN distributions are a key component of the national malaria prevention initiative and are highly effective, user-friendly and low-cost intervention to protect communities against malaria.

In populations with mosquito nets, insecticide-treated nets have been shown to reduce all causes of child mortality by about 20%; decrease cliniKenya Airways to start direct flights to UScal cases of malaria by about 50%; and, severe malaria by 45%.Under this campaign, the Government is distributing over 25 million nets countrywide. One net is given per couple in a household.

Sserwanja added: “In a bid to ensure that we achieve the objectives of the campaign, we appeal to the general public in Kampala district to register during this exercise. Only registered residents will receive the free Government mosquito nets. The registration dates are Saturday 13th, Sunday 14th, Monday 15th and Tuesday 16 January 2018.”

The LLIN campaign commenced in February last year, with the official launch in Apac District. The country was divided into six waves with the first wave covering 27 districts in northern Uganda and West Nile. During this wave, a total of 4,175,735 nets were distributed hence protecting over eight million people.

So far, a total of 17,516,859 numbers of nets have been distributed under wave 2, 3, 4and 5 hence protecting over 38 million people. The distribution of nets in the districts already covered has had a tremendous decline in the number of malaria cases as seen in the drop in the number of outpatients in many facilities in the districts.

The campaign is led by the Government, supported with Global Fund, DFID through UNICEF, USAID/PMI and Against Malaria Foundation (AMF). These funds have been used for four major components; procurement of nets, transportation of nets, operations, logistics, behavior change communication, data management, among others.